Sam shook her head. How could she have been so dumb? They had always meant to do this — to go back to the stockade as soon as she was safely asleep. Both of them. As Mrs Puddleham said, they had never been apart since they had found each other again.
The Puddlehams knew the battle was coming. The soldiers had to attack soon, before even more reinforcements arrived from other diggings. The Puddlehams would stand together now.
What was the time? If only she had a watch! The attack had come at dawn, hadn’t it? Surely there was still time to …
… to do what? She tried to think. The Puddlehams wouldn’t come back to the gully with her, no matter what she told them. She might be caught in the crossfire if she tried to get into the stockade now. She could be killed, just another boy rebel —
No, she thought suddenly. There was one way to be safe. Almost safe. A way to look like anything but a rebel. And she would be with the Puddlehams, at least. The Puddlehams were right. Sometimes you had to stand together!
Sam wrenched the tin chest open, then struggled out of her shirt and jeans, untied the lace band around her breasts under the silky camisole, then dived into the froth of the pink silk dress. She reached back to zip it up —
Hooks! Not a zipper, not even buttons. She managed to get the first few hooked together behind her back, and then gave up. She could never manage them by herself.
The lace collar! That would hang down over the open hooks. She grabbed the bonnet too. No time to tie the ribbons under her chin yet — she’d do it as she ran. No girl’s slippers, either, but her boots would be hidden under her skirt. And if anyone glimpsed boots, well, some women wore men’s boots on the diggings to keep out the mud.
And then she ran.
The track was white in the starlight. She had thought it would be hard to follow, but it almost seemed to glow. Or was the darkness lifting? She peered to the east. But there was still no dawning silver on the horizon.
The wide skirts tangled around her legs no matter how hard she tried to hold them up. The sheer bulk of the material unbalanced her. She tried to tie the bonnet on, but it kept shifting too, covering one eye and then the other, so she had to drop her skirts to put it right.
The camp was silent around her, or at least as silent as it ever got with the muttering of sleeping men and the flap of the fresh-air sails next to the mines.
Surely there should be the sound of horses, if an attack were coming? Or did they come along another road?
Had she got it wrong? Maybe the attack wasn’t this morning! Maybe the soldiers had heard about the reinforcements at the stockade. Maybe they weren’t going to attack at all.
Or maybe, she thought, I can still stop it. The thought was so powerful that cold sweat broke out under the pink dress. All I have to do is start yelling, scream, ‘The redcoats are coming! The redcoats are coming!’ The whole camp will wake up and run to the stockade. The soldiers will be surrounded before they can fire a shot …
And I will have changed history.
Should she do it? It was so hard to run and think at the same time. What would the Professor tell her to do?
And suddenly she knew. Humans are only capable of seeing small bits in the pattern of history. That’s what he’d said. All you can ask yourself is whether this bit is good or bad.
The stockade was good. The cause was good. Suddenlyit all seemed so clear. All you could do was trust that one good act would lead to another.
This act was good.
She felt extraordinary, like she’d drunk ten cans of cola, like someone had put wings on her ankles. She opened her mouth to yell …
A shot rang out. She stopped, trying to work out where it had come from. A single shot couldn’t be the attack. A digger must be making sure his powder was dry, or shooting at a rat —
Suddenly more shots, a volley of shots and then, above it all, the far-off cry of a bugle.
‘No!’ Her feet pounded along the track, her hands heaving the froth of material up around her knees. There was the main road. She raced along it, dragging her skirts now, clutching at her bonnet as it slipped over her face, nearly blinding her. She tore it off. Her heart was screaming but she couldn’t waste breath to cry. Her heart was pounding, ‘No, no, no, no …’
Something was coming. Hoofbeats! For a moment she thought it was the soldiers, and then she recognised the horse. A big brown horse, with one white foot, its sides already lathered with sweat, its eyes rolling, and a young man clinging to its back. Nick, she thought, before her mind said no, he is there, and you are here …
The horse galloped past her.
‘Whoa up, Bessie!’ She heard the horse stop behind her, the sound of hoofbeats again as it turned and cantered up to her.
‘You! Girl, boy, whoever you are!’
She stopped, her breath heaving, and stared up at him, the bonnet dangling in her hand. ‘What’s happening? Have the soldiers attacked?’
As soon as she spoke she knew the answer. Blood dripped from a slash on his arm — a cut gaping right through the blue material of his jacket. But it didn’t seem to stop him holding the reins. ‘Attack?’ His mouth twisted. ‘They slaughtered us. One minute and it were over.’
‘But that’s impossible.’ She shook her head, trying to clear it. ‘There were so many men there last night. The rebels had to win!’
‘Tricked us, didn’t they?’ The voice was hard as iron, bitter as the boiled bark Mrs Puddleham sometimes served instead of tea. ‘Time after time men came running to say the soldiers were on us. An’ each time a party went out to stop ‘em — and didn’t come back. By the time the real attack came there was only a passel o’ us.’ He was still staring at her, understanding growing in his eyes.
‘The Puddlehams,’ she said urgently. ‘Are they all right?’
‘You is the Puddleham boy. Except ye ain’t.’
Sam looked at the bonnet. She shoved it back onto her head. ‘I’ve got to go.’ She turned.
‘Stop!’ He reached down and grabbed her by the shoulder. ‘It’s a fool’s errand, heading back there. Them soldiers is killing everyone they can get their hands on. Burning tents too, no matter if the owners was at the stockade or not. I escaped ‘cause I had Bessie here, tethered nearby. Learned that long ago. Keep yer horse nearby.’
She shrugged her shoulder from his grasp. ‘I’ve got to find them!’
‘No!’ He spoke more urgently now. ‘You’ve got guts. Don’t waste ‘em under a trooper’s bayonet! Come with me. Now, on Bessie! I’ve got gold stashed away enough fer two. We’ll ride far enough they’ll never find us. Get us a pub mebbe, up Queensland way.’
How many on the diggings dreamed about buying hotels, she thought vaguely, even as she shook her head. She hauled her skirts up and ran, as he yelled after her again. ‘Yer a fool, girl! A fool!’
The sky had turned dark grey. She could see the flagpole now. An empty flagpole. Smoke drifted through the air, darker than the dawn. She could smell it now, a different smell from burning wood. Burned tents, burned dreams …
Her feet thudded down the roadway as screams echoed through the tents. Here and there now people moved — men running, soldiers carrying burning branches that they held against the canvas and bark. A child stumbled past her, carrying a shred of blanket, screaming. More and more figures struggled out of the dimness, running, yelling, shrieking — a man struggling on a bloody leg while a woman tried to prop him up so they could both run.
Hoofbeats again. This time Sam stood back, among the tents, as four redcoats galloped past, slashing with their sabres at the fleeing men. Then they were gone, and she ran again.
Now at least she could see the stockade — or what remained of it. Men lay in the street around the demolishedwalls, staring at the sky, blood on their faces, great slashes in their chests; a pile of what looked like logs of wood till you looked again and saw that they were human, the proud pikemen who had marched with their new weapons, piled upon the ground; a head cleaved open to show the
brains …
Horses reared, tethered to tent posts or hitching rails, excited and terrified by the noise and the blood. Redcoats were all around the stockade, some pulling the barricade apart, others searching through the camp. No, not searching, for everyone they saw, it seemed, they classed as enemy, whether they had been in the stockade or not.
Even as she watched, a soldier with a flaring branch bent to set another tent alight, and then another and another. A man with a beard down to his waist shouted. He pushed through the blazing fabric and grabbed a sleeping child, rolling the boy’s clothing against his body to put out the flames.
Flames … Sam blinked. Was that daylight, or just the light of fire after fire? Would the whole diggings be set alight?
Another woman screamed in the darkness. The scream went on and on. A child shrieked, running from the shadows, from some horror Sam couldn’t see. Another group of soldiers pushed their backs against the wall of a shanty. Within seconds it had collapsed, leaving the soldiers panting and cheering by the light of burning tents.
‘Run!’ A man stumbled down the road towards her, a dog panting at his heels. Was he speaking to her, or toother men ducking and twisting their way through the fires? She shrank back into a doorway as he ran past, then recognised him.
It was Happy Jack. She had never seen him without his smile before. She ran after him and grabbed his arm. ‘Jack! The Puddlehams — have you seen them?’
‘What?’ He stared at her, not understanding. Of course, she thought, I’m dressed as a girl. She started to lift off her bonnet.
‘Here’s one!’ The redcoat had come up behind. Sam shrank, but he was paying no attention to her. She heard the bayonet strike flesh, heard the gurgle as it was pulled back, looked down as Happy Jack puddled at her feet, blood gushing from his mouth and chest. His eyes were still open, his mouth relaxing back into its customary smile.
The trooper laughed, and thrust the bayonet into the body again, then ran on.
‘No,’ she whispered. The dog whined. It licked its master’s face, then climbed onto his body. It began to howl.
She wanted to hold her hands over her ears. She couldn’t bear the anguished howls. Couldn’t bear any of it, the hatred and the blood.
She gazed up at the stockade itself again. Surely there was no one left to fight there now, only a few diggers still stumbling across the wreckage, while the soldiers in their red coats clambered after them, slashing with swords, bayoneting even the bodies on the ground.
Were the Puddlehams among the stockade’s bodies? She picked up her skirts and ran forwards, through the opening.
More bodies, on their stomachs, or curled as though they hugged the ground for comfort. A small terrier howled by the body of his master, as though it was answering the cry of Happy Jack’s poor dog as both wailed their songs of mourning. But if you ignored the dead there was strangely less damage here in the stockade than down below. The tents hadn’t been torched. The gaping mouths of mines still looked the same, surrounded by their mullock heaps. Even the store was still standing, a woman sobbing in the doorway next to the slumped body of a man. It was almost peaceful, compared to the chaos below.
She bent to look at dead faces, trying not to think what they’d looked like in life, all hope and dreams now wiped away. Black beards, grey beards, open mouths with tongues protruding, others closed round bitten lips and frozen agony.
‘Lady?’ She turned at the whisper and bent down again. The boy was still alive, though blood dribbled down his chin and through his skimpy beard like a baby’s drool. ‘Lady, did we win?’
She took his hand. It felt cold and already lifeless. ‘We will,’ she promised him.
But it was too late. He’d gone.
She stood up again.
‘You!’ For a moment she thought the young redcoat was going to shoot her or stab her with his bayonet. Her legs seemed frozen. She couldn’t even speak. But then the soldier shook his head. ‘Get out of it!’ he yelled. ‘No place for young ladies here!’
It was the dress, she thought. The stupid bright pink dress. She had been right. No rebel would wear a dress of silk and lace. Had he taken her for an officer’s daughter, come to deliver a message to her Papa? But at least he turned away, thrusting his bayonet into the wreckage to hunt for hidden rebels.
She had to put the horror from her mind. She had to think. The redcoat was right. She had no place here. There was no sign of Mr Puddleham, no dress huddled in the dirt that could be his wife. Wherever the Puddlehams were — dead, arrested, fled — they weren’t up here.
She stumbled out of the stockade, the dress dragging around her feet, and down onto the road. A few of the shanties still stood, owned by loyalists who’d paid the troopers, she supposed vaguely. The wheelwright’s hut still stood as well. Even the pots were there, the big black pots they’d left only a few hours before …
‘Lucy?’ She didn’t know how she heard it above all the noise. It was a sigh, a breath, not a call. Sam whirled, and there she was, sitting on the block of wood by her empty stew pots, half hidden behind the wheelwright’s hut, holding the ladle as though about to stir.
Sam staggered over to her. ‘Ma!’
‘Shhh. Sit by me. That’s it. Two women by our stew pots, is all we are. Just two innocent women … ‘ Mrs Puddleham’s voice slipped away to a slur.
‘Ma! What’s wrong? They haven’t shot you, have they? Stabbed you?’
The smile was faint in the dawn light. ‘No, deary. Just feel … tired, that’s all. Hard to breathe like. The world is shadows at the edges, going round and round — that’s what the Professor says it does, don’t he? Just round and round …’
Sam grabbed her as she swayed on her log seat, and kept her arm around her. ‘You have to lie down.’
‘No, deary. Can’t lie down. Not yet. Not safe.’
‘But what —’ Sam looked down, as a hand tugged the pink ruffle on her skirts. She stared. The hand had come from under Mrs Puddleham’s wide dress.
‘Mr Puddleham — he’s under your skirt!’
Mrs Puddleham nodded, then laid her head against Sam’s shoulder.
A cart trundled by, driven by a redcoat, piled so high with bodies it seemed like they would topple down into the road. Sam tried to look away, but it was impossible. Some of the men were still alive, blood bubbling from their mouths or wounds. Others stared at the slowly dawning sky with eyes that would never see again.
‘Yes, deary. Mr Puddleham is safe as houses. Safe as the queen.’ Sam looked back as Mrs Puddleham’s hand stroked her cheek, faint as a cobweb in a breeze. ‘I always knew you’d look like a princess in that dress. So pretty. My little Lucy. Call me Ma again,’ she whispered. ‘Sounds so good to hear that word.’
‘Ma …’ They had to get away. To the farm, if they could, or at least back to their tent. Could Mrs Puddleham walk, with her husband below her skirts? The big woman was adead weight against her, her breathing harsh and laboured even as she tried to whisper. No, they should wait till more of the soldiers had left …
‘Shhh,’ said Sam. ‘Save your strength! The soldiers are heading away from here. We can go soon. We can —’ She stopped, as Mrs Puddleham’s hand curled around her arm.
‘My little daughter,’ she whispered. ‘So beautiful. All I have I’d give to you.’ Her breath was like a breeze now, a cold wind through the diggings. ‘The greatest joy in all the world, a child to give things to. You’ll be safe now, Sam, lovey. No matter what happens to me or Mr Puddleham.’
She had called her Sam. Tears prickled her throat. Mrs Puddleham loved the real her, not just the memory of a lost daughter …
‘Got to give you back now. I called and called. Spent years praying on me knees. Sometimes it seemed me yearning could fly across the world, it were so strong. An’ then you came. The best daughter a ma could ever have. Always knew I’d have to give you back …’
A wind was rising. A strange wind that froze Sam’s flesh but made no sound.
Suddenly Mrs Puddleham gasped. She clutched at her heart. ‘Sam, lovey. Me deary … Sam … Remember …’ The wrinkled eyes grew wide.
‘Ma!’ For the first time the term came easily.
But it was too late. Mrs Puddleham slumped onto Sam’s lap.
‘No!’ Sam shook her, then tried to find a pulse on the neck that sagged across her lap. That was what you were supposed to do, wasn’t it? That’s what people did on TV when someone was dead.
Dead. Mrs Puddleham was dead. Her eyes were open, as if they still gazed at Sam. Her mouth was still curved in an almost smile. But life had gone.
‘I love you, Ma,’ whispered Sam. But she said it for herself, not the woman in her lap. For Mrs Puddleham had smiled as she died. She had known.
The wind grew even stronger. It smelled of tin and snow. How could a wind be so cold?
Did Mr Puddleham realise what had happened? Could he tell, hidden there underneath her skirts, that the woman whose body still sat on the slab of wood, propped up by Sam, was dead? She couldn’t tell him. Couldn’t risk his coming out just yet, where soldiers or troopers might still see him, and recognise him as one of the rebels. She would have to sit here, thought Sam, holding the dead woman, pretending she was asleep …
Or was it safe for them to move? Dimly, dully, she glanced around, shivering in the wind. The diggings looked like a film set everyone had deserted. Even the soldiers were gone, apart from a few on guard up by the stockade. Screams like demented bush birds still sounded from far off. Somewhere a woman cried, almost a shriek of anguish. Flames still flickered in the wreckage of the tents and shanties. But here, next to the stew pots below the stockade, where for such a short time hopes and rebellion had bloomed, it was quiet, the still centre of a spinning world.
Still … but the wind was rising even higher. She couldhear its roar, feel its fingers through her dress. She blinked. Why wasn’t the wind blowing out the flames?
Suddenly she heard sobbing, harsh and choked, from under Mrs Puddleham’s skirts.
Yes, she thought, he knew.
Something whined next to her. A wet nose poked her arm. Happy Jack’s dog, she thought. She put out a hand to pat him automatically. For the first time the dog accepted it. He whined again.
The Night They Stormed Eureka Page 18
